NP police chief is ending 36-year caeer (John E. Atwater) (PBP) 10-16-87NORTH PALM BEACH pljBUC LIBRARY
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A tw
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JOE BROGAN 10.1
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
NORTH PALM BEACH — In Oc-
tober 1953, Bobby Greenlease, the
7 -year-old son of a wealthy Cadil-
lac dealer, was kidnapped in Kan-
sas City, Mo., by Carl Austin Hall
and Bonnie Heady,- who escaped
with a $600,000 ransom.
North Palm Beach Public Safety
Director John Atwater, who retires
Nov. 18, was then a special agent
with the FBI.
"They had killed the boy within
an hour of ter taking him f rom a
private school, but nobody knew it
and we worked on that case f or
three months — seven days a week,
12 hours a day," Atwater said.
Atwater Thursday reflected on
the Greenlease case and other in-
vestigations of a law enf orcernent
career spanning nearly 36 years.
He remembers the Greenlease in-
vestigation was going nowhere,
when events took a bizarre turn.
"Hall stashed Heady in a cheap
motel and took the $600,000 with
him for a wild time of drinking and
women," he said. "He confided in
the cab driver who was taking him
around and said he was an embez-
zler from Canada. The driver
called a friend who was a police
lieutenant and the lieutenant ar-
rested Hall on some charge and
they split the money."
However, Hall told a jailer who
he was and identified those who
took the loot. The lieutenant and
Please see RETIREMENT/CB
John Atwater, who retires next month, was a special agent with the Ff31�as bow
berore
accepg
tin the North Palm Beach job nine years a g° He recalls being as tenseest Palm Beach in 1978.
strings while arresting rrestin an armed robber in suburban
6 0 THE PALM BEACH POST
J®NN E.'
ATWATER
M AGE: 63
M POSITION: North Palm
Beach director of public saf e-
ty
. M CAREER: Served as
. U.S. Army Air Force combat
fighter pilot in England in
World War II. Earned three
Air Medals and several Bat-
tle Stars. Graduate of Uni-
versity of Notre Dame. Re-
tired Nov. 11, 1978 after 27
years with the FBI. Earned
21 FBI commendations for
outstanding work. Will retire
Nov. 18 after nine years as
public safety director.
the cab driver later went to prison.
The kidnappers were executed.
Atwater served 27 years in the
FBI before taking over in North
Palm Beach nine years ago.
Early in his FBI career in St.
Louis, he said, a rash of bank rob-
beries had the bureau hopping.
"Sometimes we'd be going to one
robbery and another would be oc-
curring at the same time," he said.
"We finally caught this guy named
John Roger Bloom after he had
robbed about 13 banks.
"He had torn out the St. Louis
Yellow Pages (on banks) and told us
he was going to rob them all."
In April 1968, he arrested embez-
zlement fugitive Thomas Nelson
Truax, who had made the FBI's 10
most wanted list.
Truax, then 28, was wanted for
stealing $500,000 in government
money from a California urban re-
newal project he hea.ded._ News. ac-
counts at the - time said the big -
spending Truax of ten tipped
waitresses with mink coats and had
unlimited credit at a Las Vegas
casino.
Atwater arrested him in a low-
key confrontation at O'Hara's Bar
in Palm Beach. "He was a big,
handsome, ex -college football play-
er who looked like he should have
been a movie star," Atwater said.
"I just walked up to him at the back
of the bar and said we needed to
talk to him outside. He said, `I
won't give you any trouble.' He had
an outstanding personality. You
couldn't help but like him."
But there were rough times, too.
In 1978, three months before his
FBI retirement, Atwater and two
other agents confronted an armed
bank robber in a home in the West-
gate area of suburban West Palm
Beach.
"He walked out of the bedroom
with a Browning 9mm (pistol) held
in the air by the side of his head. I
had a revolver aimed at his chest
and the agents on either side of me
had shotguns loaded with buckshot.
'I had told the other agents, `If
he wiggles, blow him away.'"
After several tense minutes, the
man dropped the gun. "We were
like bow strings," Atwater said.
Over the years, ex -FBI Director
J. Edgar Hoover presented him
with 21 commendations for out-
standing work.
He said his job in North Palm
Beach has been quieter, but the
department has increased in pro-
fessionalism during his tenure be-
cause of improved law enforce-
ment education and better
equipment.
"I'm also an outstanding grass
cutter who is going to have to de-
cide whether I want to become a
professional fisherman or do some-
thing that will exercise my mind,"
Atwater said of his retirement.
He has lived in North Palm
Beach since 1965 with his wife Pa-
tricia. They have six children.
When he walks out of his North
Palm Beach office for the last
time, he'll be replaced by the man
he recommended — Capt. Bruce
Sekeres. But staff memories of him
x,011 remain.
"On a personal level, he is sensi-
tive and caring," Detective Brian
O'Shaughnessy said. "You figure a
chief is just someone you have to
answer to, but he's like a f ather
figure with an open-door policy."
Detective Sgt. Ralph Pauldine
agreed. "He prefers to be in trench-
es with the guys rather than out
playing golf or socializing. His good
-~mon sense carried over to ev-
.ie here."